Strikes, Lockouts Hit Record Low in 2009

There were just five major strikes or lockouts last year — the lowest number since the Labor Department first started collecting such data in 1947.

The five lockouts or strikes last year spanned 13,000 workers and accounted for 124,000 lost workdays, both of which were also lows for the series, the Labor Department said Wednesday. In 2008 there were 15 such incidents that idled 72,000 workers for 1.95 million days lost.

Prior to 2009, the lowest number of strikes and lockouts was 14 in 2003.

That doesn’t necessarily mean there were fewer strikes, though. The Labor Department’s data track strikes and lockouts that involved 1,000 or more workers. But there are many labor unions that consist of fewer than 1,000 employees, said Kate Bronfenbrenner, a labor expert at Cornell University.

“We have increasingly smaller workplaces in the U.S.,” Ms. Bronfenbrenner said. “That data is not capturing where the strikes are.”

Over the years union organization has spread to service-sector fields that aren’t likely to include 1,000 or more people, such as unions among health-care professionals, janitors and security guards.

Other factors, such as a poor economy and a decline in private-sector union membership, may also have contributed to the drop in strikes and lockouts. Union membership among private-sector employees declined 10% last year as overall employment fell. Membership rose slightly among public employees.